Best Countries to Do Business in 2012

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What if Money Was No Object - Alan Watts

"....So I always ask the question: What would you like to do if money were no object? How would you really enjoy spending your life? Well it's so amazing as the result of our kind of educational system, crowds of students say 'Well, we'd like to be painters, we'd like to be poets, we'd like to be writers' But as everybody knows you can't earn any money that way! Another person says 'Well I'd like to live an out-of-door's life and ride horses.' I said 'You wanna teach in a riding school?'

Let's go through with it. What do you want to do? When we finally got down to something which the individual says he really wants to do I will say to him 'You do that! And forget the money!' Because if you say that getting the money is the most important thing you will spend your life completely wasting your time! You'll be doing things you don't like doing in order to go on living - that is to go on doing things you don't like doing! Which is stupid! Better to have a short life that is full of which you like doing then a long life spent in a miserable way. And after all, if you do really like what you are doing - it doesn't really matter what it is - you can eventually become a master of it. It's the only way of becoming the master of something, to be really with it. And then you will be able to get a good fee for whatever it is. So don't worry too much, somebody is interested in everything. Anything you can be interested in, you'll find others who are.

But it's absolutely stupid to spend your time doing things you don't like in order to go on spending things you don't like, doing things you don't like and to teach our children to follow the same track. See, what we are doing is we are bringing up children and educating to live the same sort of lifes we are living. In order they may justify themselves and find satisfaction in life by bringing up their children to bring up their children to do the same thing. So it's all retch and no vomit - it never gets there! And so therefore it's so important to consider this question:

What do I desire?"

- Alan Watts

"Long live freedom long live entrepreneurship"

Who remembers this wonderful speech of Mil Gibson in Braveheart?
This speech may well apply to people who work in big companies. Working in a big company is a bit like accepting to remain slave all your life, every day you wake up and you know that your work will be something similar to what you did yesterday, and then at the end of the month you are paid a salary equivalent to what your company earned thanks to only one day of your work. "This is modern slavery." The question that remains is, what do you think is better in this life . Stay like that until the end of your life ? or try your luck and create your own business ?
In the second case you may either have a passionante life and lot of success, or fail but at least as a free man. Long live freedom long live entrepreneurship.

A good comparison between the boss and the leader

Teamwork: the rules of the game ... and "I"

No doubt the union is strength, but teamwork is not always an easy task. You must know how to deal with the clash of egos or ambitions, opposition of styles and characters, interests ... Here are five rules to improve your results

In a Teamwork, everyone must know its place and plays its part.
Imagine a football team in which everyone is on offense and nobody in defense. The first rule to avoid misunderstandings is to clearly define the scope of everyone job.

Do not shoot the other players of your team
"Hello," "please", "thank you" ... too often we tend to forget that politeness and courtesy are the foundations of respect. Do not make any definitive judgments about the skills of each other. Consider instead that everyone plays an important role in the collective success. Openly criticizing the colleagues, denigrate them, distribute the good and the bad points is never the best effect. You should also admit that sometimes each other's ideas are more relevant or better than yours. Even if it's a heart-breaking for your ego! You will be better the next time

Listening !!!
Know how to listen and keep an open mind even if you do not always agree with the others point of view. Note, we do not ask you to join others as a sheep to the general opinion. Indeed, your comments (constructive) are welcome.

Humor can be a good weapon
Do its job seriously with motivation, that's fine, but do not take yourself too seriously,it's even better. Some humor, a joke can lighten the atmosphere and maintain the group collusion. Again, it's all about measuring ... We do not ask you necessarily to made ​​the school of laugh.

"It's not me, it's him" ...
In case of difficulty, blaming others, is often a protective reflex. Certainly the failure can be collective but you must take your responsibility and your mistakes ... A little courage and responsibility!

The T-Shaped Creativity

Masdar City, the city of the future

One of the most sustainable communities on the planet, Masdar City is an emerging cleantech cluster that offers a creative and entrepreneurial atmosphere where businesses can thrive and innovation can flourish, in part because the city itself serves as a model of what green urban development can be...

Follow your instinct

Solar impulse takes off from Switzerland to Morocco

(AFP) The Swiss sun-powered aircraft Solar Impulse on Thursday took off for Morocco on its first intercontinental flight attempt without using a drop of fuel. Pilot Andre Borschberg successfully launched the plane from an airfield in Payerne in western Switzerland at around 8:30am (0630 GMT), bound for Rabat via Madrid, after a two-hour delay due to foggy conditions.

Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs by Carmine Gallo

Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs - Carmine Gallo - BusinessWeek Columnist

View more presentations from Steven Duque

Renault Twizy, the new revolutionary electric car

Renault Twizy will clearly appeal to busy, carowning city dwellers looking for a second vehicle, as well as to younger drivers interested in a safe way to gain experience in traffic thanks to the availability of a version that will not require a driver's licence (depending on country).

Although its compact dimensions are likely to prompt comparisons with the world of scooters, Renault Twizy delivers all the fundamentals associated with any car, namely four wheels, a steering wheel and pedals, plus an enveloping body for two occupants sitting in tandem, one behind the other.

Renault Twizy combines real character with a resolutely modern design that boasts sweeping lines, open bodywork, original gull wing doors and a full windscreen which extends over the top of the car to form a large glazed area, not to mention the model's original lighting signature.

3 Ways to Kill a Sale

In 60 seconds, Carmine Gallo gives three ways that can kill a sale.

The Terrafugia Transition: the first flying car

The Transition combines the unique convenience of being able to fold its wings with the ability to drive on any surface road in a modern personal airplane platform. Stowing the wings for road use and deploying them for flight at the airport is activated from inside the cockpit. This unique functionality addresses head-on the issues faced by today’s Private and Sport Pilots.

The 10 Best Digital Tools for Entrepreneurs in 2012

Here are 10 of the best digital tools to help you launch and grow your startup:

1) Weebly
Using a simplified drag and drop engine, Weebly makes it possible to create a content rich website in minutes, with loads of features. The best part: it’s completely free. Created in 2006, Weebly has become a go-to for startups.

2) Legal Zoom
Founded by a team of legal and tech experts, Legal Zoom provides users with legal documents without the lawyers. In doing so, they’ve made it cheap and quick to get those legal papers you need for your business.

3) Rock the Post
Rock the Post is a social networking platform for entrepreneurs to fund and swap resources. The free site is a great tool for entrepreneurs to leverage their networks and reach new ones, to fill the missing pieces of their projects. With thousands of users and many success cases, Rock the Post is emerging as one of the best crowdfunding sites for entrepreneurs.

4) Square
Square, a creation of Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, turns your smartphone or tablet into a credit card reader. For 2.75% of every transaction, you have the ability to accept credit card payments for your business. No card reader, no credit check, more profit.

5) Hootsuite
Hootsuite allows you to manage the social media madness by cross platform message scheduling and extensive data tracking. Seamless analytics across every platform ensures less time managing and more time growing your business.

6) Expensify
To reduce the burden of managing your business’ expenses, Expensify has provided a range of apps to monitor, track, and regulate every dollar spent. The result means more security and less hassle to manage your company wallet.

7) Asana
Asana, the brainchild of Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz is a project management program that leverages the full capacity of organizational technology so that you can be connected with your team anytime, anywhere, and in an organized way. This means less phone tag, more collaboration. And it’s free!

8) Mailchimp
Mailchimp, started in 2001, seeks to make it simple to manage even the largest of newsletter lists, which is a great tool to stay connected with customers. Besides providing extensive tracking data, the service is free for up to 2,000 subscribers.

9) Docstoc
Co-founders Alon Shwartz and Jason Nazar created Docstoc to be the repository for business documents. Ease of access for transferring large documents and unparalleled choice of templates means great business documents delivered fast, for cheap.

10) Highrise
Highrise is a user-friendly CRM software that allows you to share contacts, assign tasks and track history of correspondence. Some great features include the ability to update accounts via email and assign permissioned access. The product is free for one user, and if you need multiple accounts, it is reasonably priced.

(By forbes.com)

Characterising social entrepreneurs

Giant bus which drives over cars

A giant bus which runs on wheeled "legs" that allow cars to drive underneath it has been designed by a Chinese company.

Steve Jobs explains his rules for success

Samsung - Microsoft Surface SUR40

Samsung SUR40 is the new generation of Microsoft Surface experience featuring PixelSense technology. It is now possible for people to share, collaborate and explore together using a large, thin display that recognizes fingers, hands and other objects placed on the screen.

"The spnKiX" a new invention of motorized skates

"spnKiX" are battery powered, motorized skates that strap right on to your shoes. They are hand controlled by a wireless remote. All hardware and electronics are integrated into a frame made of fiber reinforced nylon. One motor and battery pack per foot.
Peter Treadway, the inventor spoke in this interview about his new invention.

How to Tell Your Business Story in 60 Seconds

Communications coach Carmine Gallo shares tips on how to craft your business story -- covering all the essential elements -- so you can tell it it in 60 seconds. He shares the four critical questions you must answer to be ready for an elevator pitch.

The first cloud connected car " the Ford Evos concept "

Ford Evos plans for a range of connectivity systems to link the car and driver with the so-called cloud. The car might match a driver's commuting route with local traffic and weather information, or automatically play a favorite radio station. It could retrieve pollution or pollen forecasts and suggest alternate routes for allergy sufferers. Ford even claims that these technologies would communicate with the driver's house to close the garage door and turn off lights remotely.
"The car gets to know you and can act as a personal assistant," said Ford chief technical officer Paul Mascarenas. "The possibilities are fascinating when we explore how to enable a seamless lifestyle between home, office, and car."

Read more: http://www.automobilemag.com/features/news/1108_ford_evos_concept_first_look/index.html#ixzz1jHLTvZVM

Ford EVOS Concept car from Cardesign LLT on Vimeo.

Best Countries for Entrepreneurs

Top 10 of best Countries for Entrepreneurs (2011):

The World Bank Group has published their annual "Doing Business" report that ranks 183 countries on how friendly their regulatory climate is to entrepreneurs. The report provides a quantitative measure of regulations for starting a business as they apply to domestic small and medium-size enterprises. Economies are ranked on their ease of doing business. The ease of doing business index means the regulatory environment is conducive to the operation of business.

Ease of Doing Business

1. Singapore
2. Hong Kong SAR, China
2. New Zealand
4. United States
5. Denmark
6. Norway
7. United Kingdom
8. Korea, Rep
9. Iceland
10. Ireland

The Ease of Doing Business Index is an index created by the World Bank. Higher rankings indicate better, usually simpler, regulations for businesses and stronger protections of property rights. Empirical research funded by the World Bank to justify their work claims to show that the effect of improving these regulations on economic growth is strong.

Source: World Bank - Doing Business and PNMsoft

The 4 P’s of Marketing

What is marketing ?
The definition that many marketers learn as they start out in the industry is:
" Putting the right product in the right place, at the right price, at the right time. "
These four elements are the basic components of a marketing plan and are collectively called 4 P’s of marketing.

Product
Product is the actual offering by the company to its targeted customers which also includes value added stuff. Product may be tangible (goods) or intangible (services).
While formulating the marketing strategy, product decisions include:
What to offer? Brand name, Packaging, Quality, Appearance, Functionality, Accessories, Installation, After sale services, Warranty.

Price
Price includes the pricing strategy of the company for its products. How much customer should pay for a product? Pricing strategy not only related to the profit margins but also helps in finding target customers. Pricing decision also influence the choice of marketing channels. Price decisions include:
Pricing Strategy, List Price, payment period, Discounts, Financing.
Using price as a weapon for rivals is as old as mankind. but it’s risky too. Consumers are often sensitive for price, discounts and additional offers. Another aspect of pricing is that expensive products are considered of good quality.

Place (Placement)
It not only includes the place where the product is placed, all those activities performed by the company to ensure the availability of the product tot he targeted customers. Availability of the product at the right place, at the right time and in the right quantity is crucial in placement decisions.
Placement decisions include: Placement, Distribution channels, Logistics, Inventory, Order processing, Market coverage, selection of channel members.

Promotion
Promotion includes all communication and selling activities to pursuade future prospects to buy the product. Promotion decisions include:
Advertising, Media Types, Message, Budgets, Sales promotion, Personal selling, Public relations, Direct marketing.